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Aurora Innovation is putting humans back in the driver’s seat of its recently-launched driverless hauls in Texas, though they will remain observers, Chairman and CEO Chris Urmson said in a blog post Friday.
On May 1, Aurora had achieved a milestone in autonomy by launching a regular, heavy-duty driverless trucking service between Houston and Dallas, in partnership with Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines. While a human observer rides in the backseat of the truck, they do not operate the vehicle as part of the regular service.
Now, Aurora is changing where the observer sits after a request from Paccar, a long-time partner.
The truck manufacturer “requested we have a person in the driver’s seat, because of certain prototype parts in their base vehicle platform,” Urmson said. “After much consideration, we respected their request,” he added later.
Paccar declined to comment for this story, and Urmson did not divulge more details on the manufacturer’s concerns. However, he said the change was “not required to operate the truck safely” and that the observer would still refrain from operating the heavy-duty truck at all, even if seated in the front seat.
Instead, humans are merely there to "assist with a timely recovery" should the Aurora Driver pull over to the shoulder of the road after adverse incidents, like a tire blow out or bad weather that has yet to be validated for autonomous driving, a company spokesperson told Trucking Dive. The observers have no role in making that determination, per Aurora.
“This observer will not operate the vehicle — the Aurora Driver will continue to be fully responsible for all driving tasks, including pulling over to a safe location if required,” Urmson said.
Additionally, he said the changes have no impact on Aurora’s “near, mid and long-term development plans.”
A week ago, Aurora told Trucking Dive the company is aiming to have a driverless route to Phoenix by the end of the year. In preparation, the company is currently piloting a human-supervised route from Fort Worth, Texas, to Phoenix, in partnership with Werner Enterprises.
Clarification: This story was updated to further explain the role of a human observer in Aurora's Dallas-Houston driverless lane.
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